


All Along the Watchtower

by debwalsh



Series: Take Up Your Shield and Follow Me [6]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Captain America - All Media Types
Genre: Graphic Description, M/M, Post-Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Winter Soldier Bucky Barnes, fanq2015
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-18
Updated: 2015-06-18
Packaged: 2018-04-04 22:59:35
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,795
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4156188
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/debwalsh/pseuds/debwalsh
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In the aftermath of the fall of SHIELD and the rise of Hydra, the Asset breaks programming and becomes.</p>
            </blockquote>





	All Along the Watchtower

**Author's Note:**

> So, I've been working on this story for over a year. Last summer, I started on my multi-storied epic, Take Up Your Shield and Follow Me. It was going well. Until I found myself distracted by other ideas. So, this overarching story took a back seat to On the Air and I, Barnes, and the Considerations universe. But this continued to nag at me. I've posted several pieces out of order because they really could stand on their own. Now we're into the stories that need to follow a sequence. I'm still working on my other stories, but I really need to get this series to a point where it will leave me alone. And that means getting the stories written. 
> 
> This is the most graphically violent story I think I've ever written. I don't like to read violence, and I definitely don't like to write violence. I'm in many ways a pacifist. But, some days, you just have to turn it over to the characters, and let them have their say.

_“Best friends since childhood, Bucky Barnes and Steven Rogers were inseparable in both schoolyard and battlefield. Barnes is the only Howling Commando to give his life in service of his country.”_

**Mission objective:** Destroy target Steve Rogers, aka Captain America.  
**Field adjustment:** Unacceptable. Break protocol. Til the end of the line.

Two days had passed since the destruction of the helicarriers, the collapse of SHIELD’s Triskelion, its own drop into the Potomac, and its unexpected and unplanned rescue of its target. Those first two days had been spent in what others might term agony. The Asset catalogued the long list of aches and pains, fever and chill, and dispassionately dismissed each one as irrelevant to its mission. Compartmentalized, driven down where they were no longer part of its awareness. 

Unlike failure. There was no escaping failure. The handlers would not tolerate failure.

It had failed its mission. The only thing it could look forward to was _wipeandstartover_. Containment. Ice.

If the Asset had emotions, it would know fear.

_It didn’t like the ice._

It had allowed the target to survive. The target was badly battered, barely alive when he fell from the helicarrier. A lesser man would have died long before the target fell unconscious. 

The target lived.

No. The target lived because the Asset failed its mission.

The target lived because the Asset _chose_ to breach mission protocol and recover the target, saving the target’s life instead of taking it as ordered.

The Asset did not understand, but the handlers’ orders had been supplanted by what appeared to be an older imperative, underlying programming. Predating programming, perhaps. Base code.

_Protect._

_At all costs._

Two days ago, the target had not stirred, although the Asset had confirmed the target still lived. Then watery breaths, strangled breaths taken upon the shore. An echo of a sound that the Asset could not place, yet felt achingly familiar. As the target coughed and hacked and fell back unconscious against the bank, the Asset studied the odd impulse that tickled the edge of its awareness. Not just protect, but actively care for. Take action. This was outside its standard programming, and the Asset did not act on the impulse, the imperative that at once felt so alien abdn yet so familiar. It once again questioned if this might not be base code. But the Asset did not know how to care. It had no operating parameters for the activity.

The Asset did not know if this condition would change, if programming would be adjusted, because others came and found the target. Others gathered the target into their arms and touched him. The Asset frowned, fingers flesh and metal twitching. Reaching to touch the target, too. The Asset did not _like_ others touching the target.

But the ones who touched the target seemed to know what to do to care for the target. They brought others who bound the target’s wounds, hooked him up to fluids he clearly needed, and carried him from the muddy edge of the river on a board, took him away in what the Asset identified as an ambulance. 

So the Asset hunkered down in the high marsh grasses that shielded it from view, the Asset watched, unobserved. Waited. The Asset crouched in the high grasses and considered following the ambulance, to ensure the target was secure. The Asset did not want to be separated from the target. The Asset wanted to follow.

Again, the Asset did not act on this impulse. The Asset remained hidden from view.

The others who helped the target would see only the mission, not its failure, not the Asset’s choice.

The Asset could not be captured. Capture could prevent ifrom locating the target at a later date. Capture could lead to being handed over to its handlers.

_Wipeandstartover._

Capture would mean the ice.

The Asset had made a _choice_ , not a tactical decision. The handlers would not be pleased to learn the Asset had taken independent action, had allowed the target to live, had allowed the target to be retrieved by his own handlers.

The Asset _chose_ not to care.

These things the Asset observed from its vantage point. The Asset remained unmaintained, unattended. The unattended Asset had dealt with injuries sustained on the failing helicarrier without assistance, using the strength of the damaged prosthetic to pull the flesh arm back into optimal alignment and wrap it to stabilize the break. The break was knitting, and partial function had already been restored, enough that the Asset could manipulate small objects with the flesh hand. Any discomfort accompanying the action was ignored as invalid input. The damage to the prosthetic would have to wait until the flesh hand was fully functional again.

The discomfort of realigning bone and tending flesh was nothing to the metabolization of the suppressant drugs. For two days, the Asset fought the effects of the drugs withdrawing from its system, ripping its body apart and leaving it panting in the mud. The Asset emptied its stomach of fluids, nutritional compounds fed to it by its handlers through a stomach tube before the mission, a secondary bag secured to the inside of its leather armor should sustenance be required prior to its returning to base. Its body evacuated in other, unfamiliar ways, quickly overwhelming the catheter and bag secured in the lower portion of its armor. The Asset had been forced to remove the catheter, empty the bag, eliminate directly. The Asset was rarely active long enough to require such measures. 

The Asset shivered and whimpered and writhed and sweated and burned through the unfamiliar sensations, the unwelcome body functions.

After two days, the Asset’s thoughts were clearer, the nausea and fever and diarrhea fading into memory, and finally it opened its jacket to fit the feeding tube in place and empty its last bag of nutrition. It closed his eyes as its stomach filled, and laid back on the grass to rest and plan its next move.

Plan. That was an action unfamiliar to the Asset. Strategize, calculate optimal angles, even deploy and coordinate its support team – all were within standard mission parameters. But to plan for itself? That was an independent action, something the Asset would be punished for. In an unfamiliar corner of the Asset’s mind, an awakening being cried out, “Fuck, yeah!”

The Asset sought to observe this new stimulus.

 **Mission objective:** Return to base for reconditioning.  
**Field adjustment:** Unacceptable. Adjusting mission parameters.  
**Mission objective:** Survive.  
**Field adjustment:** At all costs.

&&&

 **Mission objective:** Ensure survival.  
**Field adjustment:** Acquire necessary materials.

The Asset retrieved supplies stored in a nondescript backpack from the cache point, a locker in Union Station in downtown Washington, DC. It was one of several supply dumps within the limits of the District of Columbia, and this was the closest to its current bolthole in the spaces between the train tunnels. The caches were designed to provide support to the Asset or any other active Hydra agent should it be separated from its handlers in the field, or upon completion of its mission where it might be unable to return to base immediately. This cache was a standard supply dump, without heavy artillery or explosives. This was simply for survival, not a new mission. 

Additional drop points were located in the suburbs of Virginia and Maryland, as well as throughout the continental United States and outlying nations. It might have to access the caches closer to Washington, but only if necessary – further from the urban center, it was more exposed, and transportation would more of an issue. It would not approach those supply depots until it had exhausted the resources closer to the urban center, and removed potential threats. If it had to expand its perimeter, it would acquire transportation. The Asset could drive a vehicle. It could pilot an aircraft. It could commandeer and operate a locomotive, although the idea caused an odd electrical response in its cortex. The skill set was part of the Asset’s programming for extreme situations. 

For now, in order to meet its primary objective, one of its ancillary objectives was to remain outside of custody, and that meant operating below the radar of both law enforcement and its handlers. A vehicle was contraindicated at this point in its mission.

It had observed this particular cache for two days before approaching, ensuring there was no surveillance in the vicinity, or Hydra personnel. The Hydra operatives it saw at the station were in transit. It observed their departures, and while it would be logical to assume returns to the transportation hub, few made a round trip. It estimated less than 10% of the Hydra operatives who had exited the city the last two days through this access point had returned.

The sensation it felt when it saw two of its team of handlers remove themselves from Washington, DC and not return was unfamiliar. Sensation was unfamiliar. Its handlers departed without providing instruction, without arranging transport or maintenance. 

The Asset withdrew into a shadowed alcove of the busy transportation nexus and checked the contents of the backpack. Cash, IDs, field rations, extra clips of ammunition, a sealed envelope with orders directed to the Asset, the only thing specific to the Asset in the backpack, for something that wasn’t a person. Orders from the handlers who would wipe it if it were to return to them. It knew without looking at the orders, they were instructions to surrender itself for cryostasis, the location of where it should report for memory wipe and storage. Wipeandstartover. Returned to the ice.

The Asset found that conflicted with its new imperative. 

It scanned the IDs, evaluating their utility vs. their potential threat, and determined that if issued by its handlers, they also provided a way to track it, and created a greater threat than no ID at all. A small scanner in the backpack could be used to scan the user’s face, then imprint the image on all the cards. Hydra technology, linked to a Hydra server. Exposure. Capture.

It crushed the scanner and then each one of the IDs in turn in its prosthetic hand, barely taking note of the whine of the damaged plates repositioning as the arm mechanisms bore down on the flimsy cards. Driver’s license, credit card, library card, SHIELD, CIA, NSA identifications. As if anyone would look at it and assume it was anything more than a weapon. It could easily acquire untagged identification by other means. It could survive without identification if necessary. It dropped the mangled cards into the trash can.

It fingered the cash with its flesh hand, testing for markers or tags of any kind, but found nothing. Nevertheless, it would endeavor to exchange the bills for random currency as quickly as possible. There was enough cash in the envelope to cover modest living expenses and materiel for several weeks if it was careful. The Asset knew how to be careful with money, although it could not say how it acquired this talent. The cash would last more than a month, possibly two, especially as it would find ways to supplement where necessary.

The field rations were sealed in blank packets, and it knew that they would fill standard nutritional requirements and nothing else. There were no fluid bags. Food was meant for operatives, but the Asset knew that it needed nutrition to operate optimally. It had little experience of solid food, but it remembered seeing members of its Strike team eating rations. It could do the same.

It tore one packet open with its teeth, shoved the bar whole into its mouth, chewed briefly and swallowed it dry. It stood there a moment, waiting for the odd sensation of something solid moving down its esophagus, peristalsis moving it along toward the stomach where it would be processed like the nutritional fluids. It would curb the annoying pangs in its stomach, pangs that had been growing in frequency and intensity since its nutrition pack had drained dry. Removing the pangs would allow it to focus on more important objectives, at least for a day or two. 

The Asset’s metabolism required frequent nutritional intake, and excessive activity would increase the requirements accordingly. The past several days, two on the river bank, two in the tunnels, had left it impaired due to insufficient nutrition. It ripped open a second packet, ate that as mechanically as the first, crumpled the wrapper and tossed them both into the nearby trash can. It would save the rest for later. The dry packets were minimally effective. Then it would acquire additional liquid nutritional supplements using the cash provided, exchange the bills for new ones. It would achieve two objectives simultaneously.

The ammunition fit the weapon it carried hidden under the folds of the long dingy coat it had liberated somewhere between the banks of the Potomac and Union Station. Standard issue artillery. The coat masked its combat uniform and its arsenal. The weapon it carried was not a weapon for close quarters, but its handlers had not anticipated the need for a hand weapon. It still had its knives, left outside calf, right pelvis, upper right arm, left pectoral, right boot, right wrist. The garrote would slide out of the channel circling the throat of its leather armor. The Asset adjusted its evaluation based on its inventory. It had no need of a hand weapon. 

It _was_ the weapon. 

Finally, it reviewed the contents of the orders packet, committed them to memory, crumpled the pages into a ball and shoved them into its mouth, chewing steadily and without pleasure until the paper was fully masticated. It was no better or worse than the nutrition bar. Then it spat out the wad into a nearby trash receptacle, shoved the remaining supplies back into the backpack and exited the station in search of the address in those orders. The Asset adjusted its mission parameters. 

**Mission objective:** Seek Hydra and destroy.  
**Field adjustment:** With extreme prejudice.

&&&

 **Mission objective:** Eliminate threat of memory wipe.  
**Field adjustment:** Immediate and complete.

The Asset folded itself low to the ground and waited, observing from a vantage point across the street and atop the roof. After a full twenty-four hour cycle of no activity, it re-checked its weapon, slid its fingers smoothly over the various locations where it’d secured blades, and stood up. Within the cold façade was a vault, and within that vault was the stuff of nightmares, the stuff of its nightmares. It needed to be destroyed. It needed to be destroyed by the Asset. Today, that was the vault’s purpose, and the Asset’s.

Its approach was more covert than its previous ops in the District. It had no support, no handlers, no backup. It stepped to the edge of the roof, tested the security of its grappler, and looked down at the empty alley below. Without hesitation, it stepped off, rappelling down the side of the building. On the street level, it unhooked the rope, let it fall away, and stalked toward the secure location in a lesser populated area of Washington, DC.

The system recognized the Asset immediately; it was, after all, expecting its return. The Asset probably triggered an alarm somewhere, some system noting the reacquisition of the Asset. It tore the scanner from the wall with one crunch of the prosthetic hand. Next, is disabled the door’s closing mechanism – it would not be trapped here. It passed through and disabled security measures at seven different checkpoints before it arrived at its destination. The vault itself. 

It had encountered no personnel. No resistance. Nothing. It was vaguely disappointing.

When it entered the room where its handlers would lock it in the chair and manipulate its memories, it found no one present. They had all run. There had been no countermeasures, no one waiting to recapture it. No one waiting with the mouthguard so it would not bite through its tongue when the chair engaged. The doctors, the technicians, the agents – all were gone. The master, the one who decided how much the Asset hurt, how long the pain lasted, how many times … he was not there. All that was left was the equipment, the subtle whirr and click, hiss and spit of equipment counting off in predictable, measured cadence.

The chair sat in baleful silence. The chair was the source of all pain, all degradation. The chair was the thief that stole whatever remained of the man it once was. It paused, staring at the chair. If the chair removed memory, removed self, was it possible that it _was_ the person its last target claimed it to be? Had that person been lost to the pain and the burn? Was the Asset really a _person_? It shook its head. That was a ridiculous concept. It deleted the thought.

But the thought refused to stay deleted. Again, its brain posed the question. Was the Asset a person? It stood in the center of the room echoing with its own screams and considered the question dispassionately, for that was the only way it could consider anything. It had no passion, no emotion.

Because Hydra had repeatedly burned it away.

Why? Why go to all that effort? The Asset was the Asset. It was loyal, it was efficient, it was obedient.

Until it wasn’t.

Oh.

The Asset had the potential to be a person. Perhaps because the Asset had _been_ a person.

Before the chair. Before the ice.

Perhaps the Asset had been Steve Rogers’ person.

_You’ve known me your whole life …_

The thought filled the Asset with an unfamiliar warmth suffusing its entire body, pulling at its lips, coiling in its gut. This feeling was not hunger or satiation. This feeling was … this feeling was something the Asset wanted to feel more of. 

If the Asset had been Steve Rogers’ person, then perhaps the Asset wasn’t an “it” but a “him.” 

Steve Rogers claimed the Asset was his person, his Bucky.

The Asset was a him. The Asset was _he_ , not it.

 _He_ looked around the cold vault and its contents. _He_ wanted to destroy it. _He_ wanted to ensure it could never be used to erase _him_ again.

In the palm of his hand, he carried a thumb drive purchased with some of the cash left him by his handlers in the supply cache. It was the largest drive the electronics store carried, and he had got a second one stowed in a pocket in case he needed it. Redundancy. He walked up to the computer console, fitted the drive in place, and typed in the command to copy data to the drive. He didn’t know how he knew these things, but he did, just as he knew how to adjust his aim to make up for crosswind, how to take advantage of his opponents’ weaknesses, how to assess threat potential. This place ranked high. 

As the files downloaded, he took his weapon and unleashed all the rage and pain and terror he had collected, stored up over the years while in Hydra’s control. He gave special attention to the chair.

When it was done, nothing larger than an index card remained in the room, and few shards were larger than his thumb nail. The only thing remaining intact was the computer and the thumb drive. He verified the files had transferred, pocketed the thumb drive, and brought his metallic arm down on the computer, again and again and again until the computer was nearly pulverized and the table it sat on was damaged beyond repair.

Standing in the midst of the carnage, he reviewed his handiwork and nodded once. It would do.

He felt satisfied. For the moment. There were still many more Hydra bases near the nation’s capitol. There was still more he needed to do. But first, he was a person. A person needed a place to stay, food to eat. A name. He would find a name.

Bucky.

Who the hell is Bucky?

He knew hell. Could he get to know Bucky?

Would Steve Rogers help him find Bucky?

Perhaps.

But first he had to ensure that Hydra could not reconstruct anything from this facility. He made his way back up through the building to the street level, where he found himself face to face with one lone, frightened security guard. Old, out of shape, terrified. Before the man could react, he’d snatched up something from a nearby desk and flung it at the guard’s head, knocking him unconscious. This was unusual, but he didn’t make him as Hydra.

Steve Rogers would show mercy. He – the Asset – did not have an immediate need to kill. So he didn’t.

As he stalked out of the bank, he snagged the guard’s collar in his prosthetic hand, and dragged him behind and out into the street. Once he judged a safe distance, he dropped the guard propped up against a wall, and turned to look back at the bank. His face was blank as he drew out a small device from a pocket, held it in the palm of his synthetic hand for a moment, then passed it to his flesh hand, hefting the weight of it, feeling the heat of it where it had warmed next to his flesh. With a small nod to himself, he pressed the button on the device, and the building erupted into gouts of flame and broken stone.

The person formerly known as the Asset turned and walked away. A tightening at the corner of his mouth might have been an involuntary reflex, and few who might see him would term it a smile. But a smile it was, nonetheless.

 **Mission objective:** Survive as a person.  
**Field adjustment:** Food and shelter required.

&&&

 **Mission objective:** Hide in plain sight.  
**Field adjustment:** Assimilate into general population. Become a person.

He acquired civilian clothing, camouflage with which to infiltrate the population. Underwear, jeans, shoes, t-shirt, loose-fitting hooded jacket, cap, work gloves. He considered his reflection in the fly-specked mirror of his rented room, his base of operations. The reflection stared back him, hollow-eyed and blank. Stubble formed on his jawline and upper lip. The jacket and gloves masked the prosthetic arm, the hood of the jacket masked the angry red flesh snaking up from the left shoulder through the back of his neck and up his scalp. The cap shadowed his face and shielded it from casual notice.

He had also learned the value of personal hygiene. When he’d been Hydra’s asset, he was frequently not released from cryostasis long enough to need personal maintenance. And when it was required, a technician would oversee the process, to ensure there were no complications with the prosthetic.

Now fending for himself, he’d discovered that manual hygienic maintenance was required, and he who had been the Asset learned to strip himself naked and stand under the spray of the shower head, soaping his body in all the folds and hidden places to ensure maximum clearance. He found the sensation of the shower soothing, and so would remain under for longer than strictly required to meet the requirements of cleanliness. He found that the regular maintenance had several benefits, including greater physical comfort, and fewer odd looks from civilians when he left his rented room. This allowed his actions to go unnoticed, which fit the mission parameters. This allowed him to act like a person.

He had money, bills laundered through various purchases. It had been several days now, and he did not believe that his Hydra handlers were coming back. There would have been reprisal for the destruction of the base if they were. 

He did not sleep in the too-soft bed, but made a nest of pillows, cushions, and blankets on the floor. He did not sleep for more than an hour or two at a time, and woke edgy and restless. Hydra never allowed the Asset to rest, instead prodding it awake at irregular intervals to ensure compliance. He realized that simply sleeping through the night would be a victory over Hydra. But sleeping through the night was a goal he might not reach, when his slumber was interrupted by vivid and terrifying images. Dreams, the base code remembered. Nightmares. Memories.

He had sufficient nutrition to last him for several more days before he needed to restock. He had purchased toiletries after watching hours of television broadcasts one night when sleep eluded him. Sleep always eluded him. Or perhaps because of the images, the dreams, the memories, he avoided sleep. Sleep meant ice and falling and loss and pain. He avoided sleeping. He was awake most nights. He learned to use the nights to study people on the television, on the internet. He stored the knowledge. 

To help him become a person.

A certain level of personal hygiene was expected of anyone who would enter the general population, a person. He had washed his body, washed the hair on his head carefully, avoiding the sensitive areas where the skin was inflamed along left shoulder, neck, and scalp, brushed his teeth to remove the residue that collected there. 

He assumed the odor wafting up from his metallic arm was normal, because he had no baseline to which he could compare. The area was clean, and he had had repaired what damage he could – any further repairs would require an outside agency, and the Asset had yet to identify anyone he could trust. There was no way to repair further damage caused to the prosthetic in the field, so it was possible the odor was due to damage to the organic component. The organic component generated electrical impulses he associated with pain, but he dismissed this as invalid input, ghost data. There was no organic component where the pain impulses registered. He did not know how he knew this, but he did.

He had now been out of cryostasis for more than two weeks, and the suppressants and psychotropic drugs were leaching out of his system. He learned to drink quantities of water, as it helped his system evacuate the foreign chemicals. The hygiene routine also sloughed off drugs extruded through his dermis. He even chopped off some of his hair, and shaved his thickening beard, to remove more of the contamination. All material removed from his self was burned or treated in acid to remove DNA trace evidence. He acquired bleach to pour into the toilet and drains.

He greeted each day with greater clarity, greater sense of purpose. Cases of water were an excellent investment and helped him exchange Hydra-provided currency with unmarked bills. Hydration in turn increased clarity.

In the past two weeks, he had taken out three Hydra bases in the environs of Washington, DC. One in the city itself, another in Bethesda, and a third in Old Town. Each time, he had been met with no resistance, based devoid of personnel. Each time, he had reduced the base to rubble after downloading as much information as he could before pulverizing the computers. 

Each time, he felt more human, less Hydra’s toy.

There were more bases in the vicinity of Washington, DC. He’d require a vehicle to extend his reach. He’d identified a car dealership that wouldn’t require identification if sufficient money was offered. He acquired a vehicle and started striking out further from the urban center.

One base fell, then another. Anapolis. Silver Spring. Hunt Valley. Richmond. Elkins.

Each day opened a new possibility. Each day, he targeted another base. Each day, he took what he could, and destroyed the rest. Each day, he eliminated a little more of the threat.

The mission objective of survival outside of Hydra appeared to have been met successfully in the short-term. As an ongoing objective, the support structure was in place, and no real alteration to the protocol was required. He had no handler to tell him that he was doing a good job or doing a bad job. There were moments when he was curiously filled with uncertainty, almost fear, at the idea that no one would make practical decisions for him. He was used to making tactical decisions in the field, but the practical … that was something that he had not been responsible for.

But he had adjusted to the new reality, applied tactical techniques to the practical, and reached some level of success.

He drank down another bottle of water, then crushed it, staring at his reflection. The young face looking back at him didn’t blink, didn’t smile, didn’t emote at all. Sliding sunglasses on, he turned away and exited the room.

Time to identify a new mission objective.

 **Mission objective:** Find Steve Rogers.  
**Field adjustment:** Reconnaissance required.

&&&

 **Mission objective:** Learn about Steve Rogers.  
**Field adjustment:** Begin at Smithsonian.

He restlessly explored the Smithsonian exhibit on Captain America and the Howling Commandos. He’d been drawn here by images of the man who had claimed to know him, exhortations on television and newsprint to come down and see the Captain America exhibit. He came in search of Steve Rogers. He came in search of Bucky. He came in search of being a person. 

In the past several days and especially nights, he’d watched a great deal of television, and not all of it had been infomercials advising him on personal grooming. Many of the news and pseudo-news programs had done pieces on the exhibit, some serious and questioning, some accusatory and challenging, some focused on civilians impacted by the disaster, some focused on the political fallout, some focused on the economic cost. 

The number of shows and opinions and people willing to impose their points of view had not abated in the days since Hydra clawed its way out of the corpse that was SHIELD. Since the day the helicarriers fell from the sky, and Steve Rogers offered his life up to his hands. The hands of the Asset. The hands that Steve Rogers hoped belonged to Bucky Barnes.

The hands that _he_ hoped belonged to Bucky Barnes.

Some of the newspeople questioned the loyalty of Captain America, of Steve Rogers. He found this oddly offensive. He had felt an even odder sensation when the person on the television had interviewed Tony Stark, and Stark had responded, “You’re screwing with me right? Steve Rogers not loyal, not patriotic? Talk to me when you get your head out of your ass. I got nothing more to say.”

An unfamiliar and strange sound rumbled from his chest then. Rusty and disused, it might have sounded like laughter. It felt strange, but not unwelcome.

And now, standing in the crowd in the Smithsonian, looking up into the faces of people who’d died long ago, people who’d followed Captain America – no, who’d followed _Steve Rogers_ , the little guy from Brooklyn – into the jaws of death. He frowned as he thought he heard his own voice echoing in his ears.

“I don’t know you.”

“I’m not him.”

I.

Steve Rogers could not have known what a gift that was. The awareness of I. Not simply a pronoun used to identify one’s physical self, but a state of being. I exist. I am.

The face that looked like his mirrored self looked into the middle distance, but he did not feel a sense of I. It was he. Up there in the exhibit, the he was James Buchanan Barnes. He was Captain America’s childhood friend. He was who Captain America, Steve Rogers, wanted.

I was something new entirely. I needed more information, more details. I had an itch in the back of his neck, a fluttering up the inside of his skull. Sensations ghosting over his skin. Sounds echoing in the recesses of his mind. Could this be memory? Or a connections going bad? Programming collapsing? Or was there someone still there, buried deep under the layers of programming, pain, and ice?

I did not know, but I had a new mission imperative.

To be.

And to find out why and how Steve Rogers, Captain America, his _mission_ , for fuck’s sake, had awakened I.

The epithet caught him off-guard, a voice that sounded just on the edge of familiar, but I could not say why.

You’re my friend.

You’ve known me your whole life.

I have a friend.

I had a life. I had a past.

I have a future?

Adjustment to mission objective.

 **Mission objective:** Discover “I.”  
**Field adjustment:** Investigate further.

&&&

 **Mission objective:** I behave like a person.  
**Field adjustment:** Interact with people.

I stayed at the Smithsonian until it closed, camouflaged by the swirl of tourists who wandered through the exhibits, gawking at images of Steve Rogers and his team. I circulated in the exhibit, varying the pattern and length of time before each part of the exhibit. It surprised I when the old security guard came up to him to remind him that the museum was closing, and asked gently, “Relative of yours, son?”

I looked at him with a puzzled frown.

“Anybody looks at you can see the resemblance. You’re the living spit of Barnes. Think you were his twin if I didn’t know better,” he added with a gap-toothed grin. “Bet Cap would love to clap eyes on you, kid.”

“I bet,” I replied tentatively, echoing the man’s words, and watched the old man for a moment more before testing the muscles of his face to draw them into what he intended to be a smile.

Apparently it worked, since the old man grinned wider at him. “Yeah, guess you get that a lot, huh? Good-lookin’ fella like you? Betcha got all the dames’ hearts a-flutter!”

“Yeah, betcha,” I agreed, following the old man toward the exit and went through out into the cool evening. Something sounded off about the old man’s statement. Dames. Women. I had a vague memory of soft curves, stacked heels, a line drawn down a shapely calf. I’s hand splayed against the curve of a back. An itch that thrummed to a beat, a cadence unlike anything I’s handlers had ever used.

Music. Dancing. Smoke-filled dancehalls. 

Red lips.

Frustration.

Want.

Pain.

Overwhelming desire.

Fear.

I shied away from the sensation, the memories. I had watched programs on the television about men and women, romantic encounters, comedies, dramas. I had watched them kiss, touch, stroke, and fondle. 

There had been no pain in the observation.

No fear.

There had been a mild interest on the part of I’s anatomy at watching some of the more explicit material. I had a murky memory of touching. Touching by choice, not by order. Touching that was kind, not cruel. Touching that felt good, not designed for maximum pain and damage

I remembered, brows drawing up into a frown. I remembered … casual touches, touches that conveyed simple messages of greeting, support, affection. Of desire and intent. Touching the soft skin of a woman, the painted curl of her lips, the silky wetness between her legs. The woman touching I. I’s cheek, I’s chest, the hard flesh of I’s groin. I remembered heavy breathing and fevered motion and frustration, voices screaming inside I’s head that I wanted something other, someone other …

Blue-veined alabaster skin drawn taut over a small ribcage.

Sun-dappled hair flopped haphazardly over one very blue eye.

Charcoal dust on fingers, drawn in pictures of want across I’s own flesh.

_Fear._

Fear and want and panic and desire, all at once. Need. Overwhelming _need_.

Panicked, I called up the images from the Smithsonian display and played them against the inside of I’s eyes.

Captain America.

Howling Commandos.

I’s face on a stranger’s soul.

Steve Rogers before.

_Steve Rogers before …_

Huh.

Oh.

_Oh!_

More memories surfaced then, need so desperate I felt I’s self burning from the inside out, kisses fevered and frantic, teeth clacking and lips bruising and _oh_. The feel of _him_ in I’s arms, the electric crackle of his touch on I’s skin, the taste and weight of his cock in I’s mouth, hot and thick and thrumming with life … the tight, impossible heat of him around I’s cock, drawing declarations of love and fealty and everlasting devotion from the depths of a soul I did not believe I had …

And fear. Ever present fear, flickering at the edge of every memory that assaulted I, blotting out the images like a double exposure left too long.

And with the fear came pain. Pain slicing through the limb that was no more, slinking up I’s shoulders, sliding up I’s neck, digging into I’s skull, searing I’s brain with the heat of a thousand electric probes. I remembered the probes, the scalpels, the molten metal running through I’s brain.

 _I remembered._

More and more with each passing second. Memories, shocking, painful, joyous, poignant, terrifying, quiet. And the pain grew more insistent, more demanding. Exploding behind his eyes, robbing I of I’s breath, triggering a tremor in I’s legs, threatening to give way, drive I to I’s knees.

I had been on I’s knees before. I did not like it. But I had had no choice. On I’s knees, pressed down by force, knees slamming into concrete, shocks racing up I’s thighs in a symphony of pain as though I’s bones had splintered, fractured. Held in place, thumb driven into the hinge of I’s jaw so I could not close I’s mouth. For the handlers. For the master. For … for the one who started all this. 

There was a beginning, I realized. 

And an end?

_Til the end of the line._

_I’m with you ‘til the end of the line, Buck._

The shocks to I’s brain were coming faster, harder, more difficult to ignore, more difficult to hide. I began to run. Through the streets, pushing I’s way through the evening strollers, the people out for dinner, late shopping, just getting off work. I ignored their complaints as I careened down the sidewalk, feeling the slithering, groping obscenity that was the assault on I’s brain.

Finally, I returned to I’s home base, pounded up the stairs without acknowledging the half-hearted wave of the desk clerk, fumbled I’s keys and wrenched open the door to I’s rented room to fling I’s self into the bathroom and kneel before the toilet, retching up everything I had consumed in the past two days. Nutritional fluid. Tasteless protein bars. Fuel.

The crawling sensation in I’s head was stronger now, and the urge to vomit increased at the same time. Pain radiated out from sharp, burrowing pinpricks, tiny needles trying to drive themselves deeper into I’s brain. Or claw their way out. 

And something else. Movement. Slithering, squirming, _things_ shifting inside I’s head.

The pain intensified, grew white hot, burning I’s brain away until all that was left was the blackened crisp of someone who might have been James Buchanan Barnes.

Someone who might have been Bucky.

Someone who might have loved Steve Rogers.

Someone who –

_Pain._

Only pain.

Pain burned away all that I was.

Pain blotted out all memory of who I might have been.

Pain blanked everything that I had begun to understand.

Pain.

But.

I knew him.

_“Bucky?”_

I _knew_ him.

Through the pain and the burning and the slippery slithering mass that was I’s brain, I _knew_ him.

And suddenly the pain expanded like the universe and in one big bang, I was no more.

_Wipeandstartover …_

&&&

Spinning. Vertiginous, heartpounding, non-stop spinning. Like the Cyclone on speed, with a steroid chaser, and a cocaine aperitif.

What the actual _fuck_?

That retching sound was close, too close. That retching sound was _him_. That awful taste in his mouth a combination of bile and blood. _His_ blood. Frowning, he touched his tongue tentatively to his teeth, probing gently for a break. Then he realized the blood filling his mouth wasn’t a result of a fight, but of him biting through his tongue.

So. He had a tongue. He had all his teeth. He wasn’t quite ready to lift his head, but he splayed his arms out and pressed his palms to the … floor, that’s what it felt like. And he could feel, in all five fingers. Ten, if you counted pressure and temperature in the metal arm. 

Aw well, he might as well. It was part of him. It had been a part of him for far too long.

Not quite 70 years.

An eternity.

Hell on Earth.

He turned his head, brought the flesh hand to wipe away the mess at his lips, scrub away the sick and the blood. Water. Water would be good about now.

A fucking cartload of aspirin. Maybe an intravenous drip.

He had a feeling that shooting whoever was responsible for the chaotic noise and splintering pain in his head would end up with him putting a bullet in his own brain.

Not that that would be the first time.

So, he had a head. No bullet in it this time. A pounding headache, a sharp pain behind his eyes. Check, he had eyes.

With a groan, he levered himself to roll over onto his back, way from the puddle of vomit and blood, away from the stink. So, yeah, he had a nose, too.

He flopped his flesh hand over his eyes, rubbing at the grit behind his lids. He was weary beyond belief, hungry, too. Drained of everything.

He opened his eyes, took in his dingy, worn surroundings, and closed them again.

And gasped as memory assaulted him. Not moments, not strings of memories like beads on a string. 

_All of them. All at once._

He remembered racing back to his room to burrow away safely to survive the onslaught of memory. He’d made it back in time.

He remembered the weeks of adjustment, sloughing off the chemical, electroshock, and physical enslavement by Hydra.

He remembered the helicarrier. Blue eyes looking up at him with hope and trust and … love? Did he dare hope?

He remembered before. The many befores when his handlers had been stupid enough to leave him out of containment just long enough for his brain to heal itself. Just long enough for him to reboot, regroup, remember. More than twenty times in the past 70 years, James Buchanan Barnes had been allowed enough time to remember himself, remember his past, remember what had been done to him. Recognize who the bad guys were, recognize who was at fault. Twenty times he’d dealt with reconciling the past and all he’d been through, all his body had done. Twenty times they’d caught up to him, subdued him, dragged him back. Eighteen times they’d broken him and put him back on the ice. Twice they’d had to revive him after he’d put a bullet in his brain, blowing out the back of his head. Then they’d put him on ice. Every time they took him out, they put him in the chair. The chair was always waiting for him.

_Wipeandstartover._

And the drugs. The drugs that Hydra pumped him full of to slow the progress of his brain healing itself, the electric current they fed into the brain cells to keep them too busy to heal. The little piece of Tesseract tech embedded in the prosthetic, where he couldn’t dig it out himself without risk touching the power source directly. He remembered seeing what happened when that awful power touched human flesh.

At Azzano with his unit.

At Krausberg, when Zola experimented. When they liberated the camp and turned Hydra’s weapons on the Hydra drones.

Across Europe with the Howling Commandos.

In Zola’s lab, after the war. Object lessons played out on other prisoners, other guinea pigs. Errant lab techs. Anyone who looked crosswise at the creep.

There had been times he’d been tempted.

When they played the audio of the plane going down. Hearing his voice, cracking over the radio, tearfully saying goodbye. To her. He was already gone by then, there were no goodbyes for him. 

He remembered the fall, the agony of his arm broken in mid-fall, flesh and bone and sinew torn straight through so that all that remained was a bleeding stump pouring his blood into the unforgiving snow. 

He’d welcomed death then, slung his figurative arm around its shoulders and bought it a drink. It had accepted. He had died. That was the first time.

He remembered the first time he’d been shoved into the cryo tube, unprepared for the soul-crushing cold taking him even further down, but death had skipped out on him that night, preferring its own company to the man who screamed a name into the frosted glass of the tube.

He remembered Zola, both during the war and then after. Vile, smug, slug of a non-human. His glee over peeling back the flesh of Bucky’s scalp, cutting into his skull and lifting it away to reveal his brain. His joy over watching Bucky’s every reaction as he sliced into Bucky’s brain, positioned wires and chips and bits of metal in his brain, poured molten metal into the soft tissue of his brain, into his flayed skin and into the stripped away muscle, drilled into the bones of his shoulder, scapula, and spine. Bucky was awake and aware and very much not assisted by any kind of painkiller during every procedure Zola put him through. And there had been many procedures, punctuated by time in cryo, his cells freezing until he might as well have been dead. He wished to be dead. God, he’d wished, prayed, begged for death.

God wasn’t listening.

_“How will we know our handiwork is properly installed if you are asleep, Herr Sergeant? You must be awake for us to test the device.”_

Fucking bastard.

And he’d play the recording again. Zola knew that recording always got to him. Even if he didn’t remember anything else, he recognized that voice, knew what was happening, knew what he’d lost. Even if he couldn’t find himself, he knew what he’d lost. _Who_ he’d lost.

Zola knew that the recording broke him every time.

The recording told him there was nothing left to live for.

The recording told him that everything he’d ever wanted was gone.

The recording told him that there was no reason to fight any longer.

The recording broke him into little pieces no one thought could ever be put back together.

He remembered being trained, nothing left of him except for the steady hand and the sniper’s eye, breathing in, lining up the shot, breathing out, target down.

He remembered trying to fight back after too long out of the tank, trying to reclaim his name, his self. He remembered the electric shock batons, the weapons. The beatings. The rapes. The surgeries with no anesthetic. Anyone who showed him any kindness, any gentleness, driven to their knees before him, a gun shoved in his hand, and the command to fire! The recoil of the gun up his flesh arm, the thud of the body. The blank, empty feeling. The chair.

_Wipeandstartover._

Next time out of the cold, his handlers wouldn’t let him free for more than a few hours at a time. Just long enough to complete the mission, then back on the ice. Then handlers would forget, would get lazy. The Asset was a thing. There’s nothing left of who he was before. Fucking monster. What a good pet. Let’s play a game.

When the memories came, the Asset became volatile. There were losses. He could still remember the feel of plunging his metal fingers into the soft flesh of a throat, closing around the larynx, and pulling it right out of the guard who’d been fucking him, showing him his own voicebox before tossing it to the floor and snapping his neck, pushing the body out and off of him.

More efforts to subdue and contain. More surgeries, removing parts of the brain Zola thought might be related to memory.

_“Why does this tissue grow back and not elsewhere? You are my greatest success and my greatest failure, Sergeant Barnes. I do not understand why the one part of you I do not need to grow back always does. Well, if we cut it out and put you on ice, perhaps we can slow the process down, eh?”_

Surgery. Ice. Chair.

_Wipeandstartover._

Not anymore.

Zola was dead. Cancer. Pierce was dead – he’d confirmed that in the news accounts of the fall of the Triskelion. He’d outlived nearly everyone who’d ever hurt him. Some, he’d taken himself. Others, time and the indignity of age, the cruelty of disease. Others … others were still out there. They had to pay. Pay for what they’d done to him. What they’d done to the world. What’d they’d done to –

James Buchanan Barnes remembered everything. The reconstruction of his brain had restored neural pathways, integrating memory from before and during his incarceration with Hydra. He’d been through the onslaught of memory repeatedly over the years, gaining mastery of his memories, coming to terms with everything that happened, recognizing that when someone hollows you out and throws you away, you can’t be held accountable for what your shell did at someone else’s hands. His body had been used, his body had been torn apart and put back together wrong. He’d been tortured, he’d been humiliated, he’d been raped, and he’d been nearly blasted out of existence.

But he was still here, dammit. And this time, _this_ time he would not allow them to make him go back to the ice.

He was James Buchanan Barnes, not the Asset. Not a thing, not a tool, not a weapon. He was Sergeant Barnes of the Howling Commandos. He was Bucky. He was …

He was _vengeance_. He was the terrible swift sword. He was God’s righteous anger made manifest.

He had already destroyed several Hydra bases. There were more in the DC metropolitan area. Up and down the East Coast. Across the US. Around the world. There were more that must be destroyed.

He would be the cleansing fire that would wipe the earth clean.

Starting now.

The recording echoed in the back of his memory, and he shook his head.

No more.

The recording was wrong.

_The recording was wrong!_

Steve Rogers lived. Steve had lain frozen in the ice, like Bucky had, waiting to be found. He was alive. And he recognized Bucky, even when Bucky hadn’t known himself.

_Til the end of the line._

The line was long and strange, but they weren’t at the end just yet. 

It wasn’t yet time for him to go to Steve. There were still threats out there that could harm him. He needed to eliminate those threats, keep Steve safe. Even if it meant keeping Steve safe from him.

He remembered his reason for living, his base code. He would die protecting Steve Rogers.

Hydra presented a clear and present danger to Steve Rogers. They still wanted to decode his serum, still wanted to create super soldiers from his DNA. If they captured Steve and recaptured Bucky, they’d have more material to work with. They might succeed.

That could not happen.

Hydra threatened Steve Rogers.

So Hydra had to die.

Starting with the man who’d led Steve’s STRIKE unit at the same time he’d served Hydra. At the same time he’d used the Asset, cruelly and repeatedly.

_“It doesn’t know what you’re doing. It doesn’t know any better. Look, maybe it even likes it. Who gives a fuck? Gotta let off some steam. Fuckin’ Rogers and his goody-two-shoes hero shit. Man, I don’t know how much more of him I can take! It’s a tight hole. Feels good on my dick. Y’should try it, man – beats your fist any day of the week.”_

James Buchanan Barnes rose from where he lay on the floor, straightened his clothes, and smiled.

He knew better. He _didn’t_ like it. 

The mission was simple.

Hydra had to die.

Starting with Brock Rumlow.

 **Mission objective:** Locate Brock Rumlow.  
**Field adjustment:** Terminate with extreme prejudice.

END

“There must be some way out of here,” said the joker to the thief  
“There’s too much confusion, I can’t get no relief  
Businessmen, they drink my wine, plowmen dig my earth  
None of them along the line know what any of it is worth”  


“No reason to get excited,” the thief, he kindly spoke  
“There are many here among us who feel that life is but a joke  
But you and I, we’ve been through that, and this is not our fate  
So let us not talk falsely now, the hour is getting late”  


All along the watchtower, princes kept the view  
While all the women came and went, barefoot servants, too  


Outside in the distance a wildcat did growl  
Two riders were approaching, the wind began to howl

Written by Bob Dylan – made famous by Jimi Hendrix. Copyright © 1968 by Dwarf Music; renewed 1996 by Dwarf Music

Read more: http://www.bobdylan.com/ca/node/25852#ixzz3dCLpKEAg

**Author's Note:**

> This was a really tough story for me to write. I never wanted to delve too deeply into the torture that Bucky must have experienced, and I don't think I've gone overboard here. But it is a lot more graphic than I'd intended. Bucky, in his catharsis, had other ideas.
> 
> I know this doesn't answer all the questions this series has raised, but we're one more step along the way. This is the story of how the Asset becomes the man who could visit Brock Rumlow in the hospital in [A Loaded Smile](http://archiveofourown.org/works/2236164). If you haven't read it, go read it now. It's one of my favorites, even though it's nothing like I would normally write. When I write James Buchanan Barnes, he takes over, and pushes me out of my comfort zone in weird ways.
> 
> Anyway, I hope this helped to fill in some of the blanks in my headcanon for this series for you. I find this hopeful, even with all the violence. Bucky is a phoenix, and he is rising from some pretty fucked up ashes.
> 
> Leave me some comment love, please! After writing this, I really could use some ... :)


End file.
